BOOK ONE OF THE RUINED REALMS
Of Wards and Wi-Fi
A Witch. A nine-hundred-year-old Vampire. A Lisbon where ancient magic has found the Wi-Fi.
Love, old magic, and very bad connections.
In Lisbon, Witches hide their real work behind incense, tourist trinkets and overdue rent notices.
Isadora de Castro runs Loja das Sombras, a tiny occult shop in Mouraria, where she sells harmless charms to the curious and real magic to the desperate. She is broke, overworked, and trying very hard not to think about the Vampire who vanished from her life three months ago.
Then Bast comes back.
He returns with a vicious glitter-Witch on his arm, a smile Isadora knows too well, and a lie sharp enough to break her heart in public. What Isadora doesn’t know is that Bast hasn’t betrayed her by choice. He is trapped—body, mind and voice—inside a spell woven from old blood magic and modern tech, forced to play devoted pet to the woman controlling him.
As Lisbon slips towards Samhain, the city’s wards begin to strain. Dissonants prowl where they should not exist. Ancient powers stir beneath the streets. A political conclave pulls Witches, Vampires, holy hunters and exiled nobility into the same room, and Isadora is dragged into a fight far older than one ruined love affair.
To survive, she may have to trust the man who told her to forget him. And Bast may have to become a monster all over again.
DESCEND INTO THE LISBON BENEATH LISBON
Lisbon is doing what Lisbon always does: pretending it’s soft while it sharpens its teeth.
Behind Mouraria’s tiled façades, old magic survives beside temperamental routers and obsolete computers. Wards guard ordinary doorways. Supernatural courts occupy impossible spaces. Ministries, monsters and ancient factions hide behind the city’s familiar streets.
At the centre of it all stands the Loja das Sombras—a shop selling harmless magic to tourists and something far more real to those who know what to ask for.
Mind the wards. Distrust everyone. And please do not connect to unfamiliar Wi-Fi.
MEET THE ONES CAUGHT IN THE SIGNAL
ISADORA
Witch. Ward-maker. Proprietor of the Loja das Sombras.
Isadora pays the rent by selling crystals to tourists and real protection to those who know what to ask for. Her magic is old, bodily and ancestral—and entirely hers.
When the man she loves reappears after three months beside another woman, Isadora has every reason to believe the worst.
Unfortunately, the truth is worse.
BAST
Vampire. Nine centuries old. Currently experiencing technical difficulties.
Bast has survived wars, monsters and the politics of immortal courts. What he cannot escape is a prison built from stolen magic, modern technology and his own public image.
Every smile online is a performance. Every lie is meant to keep Isadora alive.